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Biography
Director /Designer Motion By Design 1981 -
Present
Custom design and fabrication shop for
puppets, stop motion animation, and character product sculpts.
Puppet Designer / Fabricator Henson Assoc.
1977 - 80
Initiated and directed foam latex casting
department at the Muppet Workshop. (Custom design, fabrication including sculpting,
casting, moldmaking and crafts.)
Apprentice to Don Shalin, chief Muppet
designer. Apprenticed to Dick Smith in foam latex casting which led to ease in duplicating
Miss Piggy and others.)
Craftsperson David Hamburger Display l975
- 76
Fabrication of mechanical animation for
displays.
Craftsperson/Gaffer Action Prod. 1975 - 76
Tabletop stop-action animation setups,
lighting and stop motion rigging.
 Sal Denaro is a puppet designer, fabricator
and performer/animator whose work has been seen on stage -- screen -- and in print. His
early work is perhaps still the best known -- for Sal was one of the members of the
creative staff of the hit syndicated series "The Muppet Show". While there, he
rubbed elbows with characters like Kermit the Frog, Miss Piggy, Stattler & Waldorf and
Bunsen Honeydew -- or rather he created their elbows. There was a time few of us know
about when Muppets were sculpted by hand -- with tiny patient scissors. Thanks to Sal, all
the Muppet artists that came after him were able to create and recreate Muppets using the
foam latex casting techniques that Sal learned in collaboration with Dick Smith. From the
confines of the foam latex casting department, that Sal set up for the Muppets, he and
those he worked closely with -- the originators of the Henson style -- Don Sahlin and
"Faz' Fazkas -- worked on projects and prototypes for the movies " Dark
Crystal" and "The Muppet Movie".
All things have
their time and place -- and so Sal moved on to other puppets -- other characters -- and --
other projects. A large flower with an "appetite" for fame was one of his next
projects. Sal was called on by Marty Robinson to help fabricate "Audrey" the
man-eating plant from the hit show "Little Shop of Horrors." With Sal's help,
Audrey was given a face -- or faces -- that no one would soon forget. From there, Sal went
out of the plant store and into the forest with a show called "Wolftales". The
puppets that Sal helped director Larry Engler design and build for this off-Broadway hit
were certainly not much smaller. They were still life-sized characters -- who charged
about the set chasing and eating the actors in this fairytale spoof. By now it was time
for something a bit more refined a bit calmer -- a bit more classic. Sal was called on by
Burt Tillstrom to help in preparing "Kukla", "Ollie" and "Beullah
the Witch" to host and narrate Stephen Sondhiems's newest production -- a
tongue-in-cheek revue -- "Side By Side By Sondheim". It was Sal's job to help
Mr. Tillstrom get copies of his "children" ready for this auspicious occasion.
By now, it was time
to take charge and settle down. And so, just almost twenty years ago, Sal went off on his
own and opened the doors of his own studio-- Motion By Design. Since then, Sal has
designed, built and performed with puppets for numerous television commercials,
industrials and educational productions. Now, Sal started to rub elbows with the likes of
"Mr. Renuzit Dozit" (for Renuzit Air Freshners) and some pretty fruity little
guys for Sunkist "Fun Fruits" and Crest Toothpaste. Perhaps, some of Sal's most
memorable creations and fabrications were for Arm & Hammer (a little dancing box of
baking soda who to this day lives and dances in refrigerators on our TVs nationwide). And
who can forget that zesty little guy form Lemon Joy? Well, the list goes on. He seen in
recent days with Noddy from BBC, with Lambchop for Benjamin and Medwin, one of the 101
Dalmations for Happiness Express, and too those crazy kids from the Teenage Mutant Ninja
Turtles, as well as football playing beer cans (for Budweiser), dancing houses (for Home
Savings of America), a spacey creature (for the Sci-Fi channel) as well as an assortment
of bugs, dinosaurs (Pee Wee's Playhouse), toy trucks (Hess), stop action caricatures (for
and of David Letterman and the equally famous "Bud" Melmen), creepy zany
creatures ( for the likes of TV's fabulous Reggae dogs), dancing dishes (for beauty and
the Beast), space dudes and warm fuzzy creatures for a host of other companies. Yes,
indeed its the "A" list of the cartoon, licensing and product world.
The wisest and
sanest characters that Sal has met and made have constantly reminded him to never let life
and work in the puppet world "pull your strings" too tight or make or loose the
laughter.
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